It’s probably best to start with what we mean by Artificial Intelligence.

Artificial means something that does not occur naturally– it is simulated,

Intelligence means:

The ability to understand

To think

And to learn

It’s these characteristics that make machines appear smart. They do this through their ability to analyse large amounts of data and to recognise patterns within these data.

In recent years the biggest step forward has been Machine Learning. In the past machines have appeared to be intelligent by using formulae or algorithms to make deductions. For example if you were to win a game of chess against a “non-learning” computer then, if you play exactly the same moves again you will win again and again. Now contrast this with AlphaGo which plays the board game Go but improves its game by using the knowledge "learned" from previous games until it has become unbeatable.

I’ve grouped my selection of AI products under 4 headings:

Advertising for candidates

Identifying potential candidates

Engaging with candidates

And then selecting candidates

1. Under the “Advertise” heading we have…

Textio – Textio reviews and scores your Job Advertisement copy. It looks at how positive the language is, the use of corporate clichés and gender balance. It then makes suggestions on how you might improve your score with a number of amendments

Recruitz.io – is job Ad publishing tool that uses AI to determine the best on-line channels on which to programmatically buy advertising space and it also chooses the best time to publish your ad based on when your target audience is active on-line.

Vonq it an intelligent campaign manager. It is similar to BroadBean and Idibu in that it distributes jobs but has a very significant difference. Using Machine Learning it assess the responses from its previous postings, benchmarks all the job boards, and then posts your job vacancy to the destination that it has decided would provide you with the greatest number of applies. It continues to learn from its many job postings and is quick to spot market trends.

2. Identifying potential is where we intelligently collect data to find prospective candidates.

Monster’s TalentBin spiders the web collecting information from social media sites and industry community sites to create profiles of potential candidates (either passive or active) together with their contact details.

Beamery is a tool that builds a profile of the candidate by connecting with the organisation’s applicant tracking system database, its calendaring system and email accounts. It then looks for patterns in the data it has collected. This would include:

When is candidate most engaged

Best time to approach them

It will then send out personalized emails to potential candidates to trigger further engagement and convert them from being passive to active candidates.

Mya is one of my favourites she really does have a personality. Mya asks contextual questions based on job requirements. She then provides personalised updates & feedback together with next step suggestions. When she doesn't know the answer to a question she will query the human recruiter and learns for next time. Mya can also manage the dialogue with the candidates to help them through the post-offer acceptance process. Where a candidate has not been successful for one opportunity Mya will re-engage with them to determine their level of interest in new vacancies. It will also update the candidate’s record with any new CV details such as...

New Job role,

Skills. and

Experience

Wade&Wendy are an AI double act. Wade is your personal super recruiter and career advocate. He privately communicates with you, via chat, to talk about your career and learn about your skills and experiences. He discusses your interests and goals, and processes these conversations to provide you with personalised feedback that will enable you to discover new career opportunities. He is powered by conversational artificial intelligence, informed by network insights and trained with human empathy.

4. The last recruitment stage is Selecting candidates

Wendy is Wade’s sister. She is an artificially intelligent HR recruiting assistant. She looks at candidate profiles and cross-references these with job vacancies in order to identify the best possible candidates. Wendy is trained as a team member, handling or assisting in the many of the roles and responsibilities of a hiring manager.

Monster’s 6sense uses its semantic search engine to intelligently “read” CVs. It then scores them against the job vacancy description. The results are then shown in order of best match. Side by side displays makes comparisons between candidates easier.

Similarly Pomato is an assessment and testing tool for recruiters to hire technical candidates. Pomato uses AI and machine learning to evaluate and validate IT candidate CVs. It will also paint a visual picture showing the candidate’s skills & experience which can be used for comparative purposes.

MosaicTrack also uses AI to match current and past applicants to your new job openings for a skill and culture match by simulating how a hiring team reads a CV. It also has an AI Career Agent that reviews a candidate's interests and engages with them to find a suitable position within your organisation.

HireVue marries deep machine learning with Industrial Organizational Psychology. The product works by capturing thousands of attributes from a candidate’s video interview. HireVue will transcribe the audio, capture variances in someone’s voice and analyse the visual nuances in the answers a candidate provides and score them accordingly.

Joberate is a different sort of product but is included because it demonstrates the power and the capability of leveraging Social Media “big data” and machine learning. It uses social media to assess the intensity of employee job seeking activity. Companies sign up to the service and track the job seeking activities of their staff. In this way HR can determine whether people, or teams, are at risk of leaving. The business case for this service is that it is designed to improve employee retention. Some call Joberate the “Equifax of HR”.

New products are emerging on a daily basis. I hope this whistle-stop tour of how Artificial Intelligence is contributing to recruitment has been beneficial to you.